


Soon Becoming Now

by Angel Ascending (angel_in_ink)



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Character Study I Suppose?, Gen, Takes Place During Episode 28 Shortly Before Caduceus Meets Everyone, Visions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-20
Updated: 2018-08-20
Packaged: 2019-06-29 22:45:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,585
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15738840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angel_in_ink/pseuds/Angel%20Ascending
Summary: He opened his eyes, not surprised to see what was left of the Blooming Grove overtaken by thorns, blind white worms crawling on gravestones and devouring the last of the flowers. There were snakes crawling through the crumbling, fallen temple, but not the friendly garter snakes that sometimes slithered through the flowers or the wild mint. Massive cobras crawled over the broken stones, fangs dripping venom that left smoking pits in the ground.Something brushed against Caduceus’s arm, twined around his wrist, grew up over shoulder and rested against his ear.“Wait,” the ivy whispered in a voice that was water and wind and the rustle of leaves, the voice of nature, of the divine. “Wait. Soon.”





	Soon Becoming Now

**Author's Note:**

> Have a little something that's been sitting in my drafts folder half completed since Taliesin said that Caduceus had been having dreams and visions about the problem in the woods. I mean, you know me, I couldn't not do something with that.

Once, centuries ago, the attendants at the temple to the Wildmother in the Blooming Grove in the  Savalier Wood would have had more land to take care of. There had been fruit trees to tend, hives of wild bees, a stream full of fish that gleamed silver in the sun. At least, that was what Caduceus’s eldest sister had told him, once upon a time. Sometimes he would look past the iron fences, out at the gray, gnarled tree trunks ringed by purple-gray thorns and almost remember the feel of their bark under his hands, the green of their leaves, the way the red fruit had tasted, sweet and crisp. Apples. They might have been apples.

There were still bees in the grove, white and gray striped insects that did him no harm and pollinated the flowers, but the honey he had seen dripping from their misshapen hives in the trees beyond the fences and the thorns was the same gray-purple as whatever blight was taking over the woods, and Caduceus, as adventurous as he was with experimenting with mushrooms and wild flowers, had never tasted it.

There were plenty of edible things inside the slowly shrinking oasis he called home, or at least enough to sustain him, acorns and mushrooms and berries, edible ferns and wild garlic and a host of plants that made excellent tea. Breakfast that morning had been acorn mush sweetened with berries, and tea, the kind he always had at breakfast, the one that tasted of mushrooms and earth and helped him wake up after a night of troubled sleep. These days his sleep was always troubled, dreams waking him up before the sun more mornings than not.

After breakfast there were chores, because chores always had to be done, unsettling dreams or not, and he tended to the flowers on the graves and the other plants around his home with a smile and a few kind words for each plant and animal that he saw while performing his tasks. He was sure that plants liked being talked to, even if they didn’t talk back to him, and it was only polite to thank the birds for their songs. He spoke to most everything, including the occasional wandering spirits that haunted the woods, if only to offer them one last bit of sympathy before he laid them to rest. It was the same with the occasional bone spurred beasts that threatened the peace of the grove. He even spoke to the thorn vines that were slowly wearing away the iron fences and strangling the trees and grave markers. He heard the vines creaking in the night sometimes as their thorns wore away at metal and wood and stone.

It was almost mid-day when Caduceus stopped to rest, dirt under his fingernails and a cup of blackberry sage tea in his hands. He sat on a patch of moss and leaned back against an oak tree, sighing contentedly at a job well done, shifting a little to get more comfortable. His legs ached. He had dreamt the walking dream the night before and his legs always ached afterwards, as if he had been actually walking in his sleep instead of across a vast, arid, empty landscape, somehow knowing he was headed east, traveling companions at his side. Maybe he would go soak in the hot spring later, after he meditated. Yes, that sounded like a lovely idea.

Caduceus put down his teacup and closed his eyes, last night’s dream still fresh in his mind. He could never recall the faces of his traveling companions upon waking, only remembered them as colors and scents, blue and honey sweet or red and smelling of ink and smoke. There were seven of them normally, but last night there had been only six, the flash of lavender and the scent of incense curiously missing. He had woken up feeling just a touch melancholic about that lack with no idea why. The last of that small, unexplained sorrow left him as he slowly breathed out, emptying his mind, leaving it to be filled with other things. He breathed in, smelling flowers and damp earth and…

_Decay. It was a smell Caduceus had grown up with, same as his parents and siblings, same as his ancestors. It’s what happened to most things, given time, and it was not a smell he had ever shied away from. But there was too much of it suddenly, and it wasn’t the smell of a body going gently to its rest, or a fallen tree slowly becoming one with the earth. It was bigger than that, as if the whole world was rotting._

_He opened his eyes, not surprised to see what was left of the Blooming Grove overtaken by thorns, blind white worms crawling on gravestones and devouring the last of the flowers. There were snakes crawling through the crumbling, fallen temple, but not the friendly garter snakes that sometimes slithered through the flowers or the wild mint. Massive cobras crawled over the broken stones, fangs dripping venom that left smoking pits in the ground._

_Something brushed against Caduceus’s arm, twined around his wrist, grew up over shoulder and rested against his ear._

_“Wait,” the ivy whispered in a voice that was water and wind and the rustle of leaves, the voice of nature, of the divine. “Wait. Soon.”_

Caduceus blinked, the vision fading to be replaced with the world as it was, flowers and grass and a temple becoming overgrown with moss but still whole and sound. It was the same vision that had come to him a season or two ago, or nearly the same, almost identical to the visions his parents and siblings had had. Except they had been told to go, and he had not. “ _Wait_ ,“ the Wildmother had said, and Caduceus had waited, not even going into town as he usually did, living off what the ground provided for him. He didn’t want to miss the people he was waiting for, after all.

“Soon,” he said out loud. “Well. That’s different.”

There was a small ivy vine curling halfway up his forearm, and he gently untangled it and reached for his teacup again, brushing off the red lichen that had grown on the rim and taking a sip. The tea had gone cold, but that was all right. There was a feeling in the air of anticipation, like lightning about to strike. Soon. Huh.

Caduceus patted the moss affectionately before he stood up and made his way inside the temple, pouring himself the last of his tea. Most of his things were already packed, and his green beetle armor, rarely ever worn, shone iridescent in the light of a sunbeam. His older sister had made it for him before she left. He wondered sometimes if she was still alive, and if not, if she was resting peacefully.

There were sounds from outside, low whispers, something rustling. Caduceus quietly sipped the rest of his tea, ears twitching as he tried to determine the source of the sound. Sometimes the restless spirits of the wood made their way to his home, and they weren’t always quiet, the poor, sad things.

There was a strangled noise, followed by a thump, then silence. Not a spirit then. Visitors. When was the last time he had visitors? Seasons ago, and not the people he had been waiting for. There was still the feeling of anticipation in the air, the echoes of the Wildmother’s whisper in his ear.

Caduceus opened the door slowly, the hinges creaking and breaking the silence as he stepped through the doorway. There were five people staring back at him, and he looked them over slowly. There was a dwarven woman whose eyes were full of fear and surprise, one hand resting on the handle of her warhammer. He smiled when he saw the firbolg woman, brown furred and floppy eared and she returned his easy smile with simple, fierce joy. It had been seasons and seasons since he had seen one of his own people, so that was a nice surprise. Then his gaze fell on the human woman dressed in cobalt blue, a sunset of bruises across her knuckles, smelling of sweat, and he realized that she was one of the companions from his walking dreams, and so was the green goblin woman who was freeing her cloak from a thorny vine, and who smelled like something sharp. And there, hiding poorly behind a gravestone, Caduceus could see a human man with hair the chestnut red of certain leaves in autumn, who smelled like smoke and ink.

Three out of six, no sign of the green one who smelled like salt, or the sweet smelling blue one, or the black and white one who smelled like the air before a storm. No sign of the lavender one who smelled of incense either, but there was grief in the eyes of the three that made Caduceus think that the one who had gone missing from his dreams had gone missing from this life as well.

Caduceus finished his contemplation and realized everyone was staring at him still. Oh, right, he hadn’t said anything yet. He was going to have to make some more tea. First tea, then conversation.

“Huh. I think I’ve only got three more cups. Hold on.”

Caduceus went back inside, grabbing both the kettle and his staff as he rounded up his extra cups. It looked like _soon_ had possibly turned into _now_.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm so buying the map of the Empire when it pops up for sale if only so I can stop squinting at my jpeg of it. As far as I can tell, mostly what's in the east is Xhorhas, and to me that means Betrayer Gods, so there's symbolism here of the Crawling King and the Cloaked Serpent, both from the Tal'Dorei campaign guide. 
> 
> I'm angel-ascending over on Tumblr if y'all want to stop by and say hi!


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